The respiratory disease drug developer has collected series A funding from investors including Shionogi to fund clinical trials of its lead drug candidate .
Vast Therapeutics, a US-based developer of respiratory disease therapies based on research at University of North Carolina (UNC) at Chapel Hill, has secured $15m in a series A round that included pharmaceutical firm Shionogi, Wral TechWire has reported.
The company revealed it had raised funding last month without giving a precise amount. It has also received a $300,000 award from non-profit organisation the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation to study the effects of chemical substances on living organisms.
Vast is developing treatments that deploy nitric oxide, a molecule that is produced naturally by the body, to help the immune system respond to severe respiratory diseases such as cystic fibrosis.
The company’s lead drug candidate, BIOC51, is a powder that will be inhaled by patients to treat infections in the lungs. The series A proceeds will fund human trials of BIOC51 later this year, John Oakley, Vast’s chief financial officer, told Wral TechWire.
The technology was pioneered by Vast’s president, Mark Schoenfisch, a distinguished professor in UNC Chapel Hill’s department of chemistry.
Neal Hunter, Vast’s chairman and CEO, said: “Our objective is to completely disrupt the paradigm of treating infections. Our technology can solve a major problem at a time when that problem is creating a dire situation for public health.
“We have always realised that it would take more than one company to optimise our technology and Shionogi’s commitment to anti-infectives puts them in a small class of larger pharmaceutical companies who have an ability to develop advanced pharmaceutical products and bring them to market quickly.”
– A version of this article first appeared on our sister site, Global Corporate Venturing.
